29. Nigeria: Calabar to the Cameroon border

Calabar, Nigeria, Wednesday, 9 February, 1983

(HELENA)

This time our awakening was a bit awkward because the owners of the house were in the living room, and we were not quite sure when to get up, and whether we were keeping Silas from his surveying job. But we did eventually get to moving, and the three of us sat around while the others went in and out to buy for and prepare breakfast. Then another awkward wait because Silas insisted on driving us to our different destinations --Ben to a Lebanese-owned night club to see if the owner knew the friend for whom Ben was looking-- and us to the Cameroonian consulate. You could tell how long it has been since we have applied for visas (November in Dakar) because the guys here really got on my nerves. The wait for the car was awkward because Silas and Alfred had to push it to start it, but without our knowing it.

Back at the consulate. First they took our passports “inside” and we waited for quite a while before they brought them back and had us fill out the two forms. For that, the man (some kind of receptionist) stood over us and instructed us on every little detail. Another man came to check over the forms and insisted on writing “American” where we’d put USA. He obviously thought we were rather ignorant and thought our arguments in favor of the use of USA to be rather simple. What he didn’t realize was that he kept showing more and more ignorance by thinking South America meant southern USA. We tried a little arguing, but he smiled indulgently at our lack of knowledge and we let it drop. They told us to come back at 1400 that afternoon, but judging from the way things had gone, we rather thought it would be longer.

On the way to the consulate we saw a sign proclaiming the “Calabar Office of Hotels and Tourism”, so Ben, Dan, and I set off walking in that direction. Calabar has some neat buildings left over from colonial days (I especially liked a Catholic school that was a little rundown but was set on plenty of land, rolling hills), but as we have come to expect, NO SIDEWALKS. The streets we walked on were paved, but only just enough for two car lanes. On the edges of that there were narrow dirt shoulders followed by the usual open sewers. So, it is impossible to stroll along the streets; one must develop the ability to keep out of the path of the cars without jumping into the canal.

Upon arriving at the Office, we were asked to sit down for a moment. After some 5 minutes, a man came and told us that the one person who could give us information about hotels was out for the moment and would be back in half an hour. Oh, I must assure you that this office was the picture of efficient bureaucracy: three people sitting doing nothing and not having any of the information it was supposed to have.

Ben was hungry and we were all thirsty, so we asked the man there where we might go. He showed us into the bar-lounge for the office.  Nothing going. We set off walking away from town, but naturally there were no stores with food or drink. We did come across a reasonable looking hotel, but no, it would have cost 55 Nairas for two of us. That’s where we left Ben because he needed to continue in a taxi to “Paradise City”, where he thought they might know of his friend. We walked back to town, exploring some of the marketish streets. We had left behind the paper that gave the name of the one possible hotel, but Dan did remember the name of the place where we might ask. We found the Rolsol Cinema and fortunately we found the owner crossing from there to his Rolsol snack bar. He said he had a room for two at 15 N, so we decided to take it.        His car was soon going to the Rolsol (the man’s name is Roland Soloman), so he offered to drive us over. The room was fair and --most important  had a fan, so we stayed.

After a rest, we crossed the street to have pounded yams with goat meat and then headed back to 150 Goldie Road (Silas’ place) for our packs. He was back, relaxing on the sofa, so we got to say goodbye. He was a mighty hospitable person and quite a character to top it off. Before going there, Dan and I walked around town some more. We never got to any of the rivers that supposedly surround the town, but we did see two old, big stone churches, the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches.

Silas told us that Ben had (independently) checked into a Rolsol Guesthouse, exactly where we were staying. We headed back there and installed ourselves for a little catching up on the trip diary. Ben showed up a little later, but he had decided not to stay there because in his search for his friend, someone else had invited him to stay at their house. It sounded tempting because he would be in an “expat” community with a swimming pool. To show how nice that sounds, I’ll just say that Dan took four showers that evening. The sweat would stream off continuously. We said goodbye to Ben for the fourth time.

In spite of the poor showing in the morning, our visas for Cameroon were ready when we got back to the consulate.

At nearly dusk, we went out for another, shorter walk, through a different part of town. I was pretty eager to get back before dark because, although we were on a pretty busy street, the situation reminded me too much of the evening stroll we took in Banjul. That was the time someone tried to grab my watch.

Before going to bed, we had our third 2 liter “mineral”. The heat and humidity really makes one want to gulp cold drinks all day.

Our route, in yellow, from Calabar to the border and on to Limbe and Doula

                                                                       Calabar - Ekok - Mamfe, 10 February, 1983

(DAN) Calabar is an interesting but confusing city. It is on upland rolling ground and seems composed not of city streets, but a network of highways (narrow) that used to leave the old town in various directions. This is common in what we have seen of Nigeria and the result is that blocks are sometimes 0.5 km long without feeding streets, the blocks are irregularly shaped and the streets are extremely congested. The buildings in the older part are of reminiscent of Banjul – two-storied buildings with simple balconies and four-sided tin roofs. The confusing network of streets, no sidewalks, and high volume/speed traffic meant that we never got any directions in large towns in Nigeria but had to take a taxi. This is all justification to say that we had to take a taxi to the park, and it still took us 45 minutes.

The signs were bad where we arrived: the Taxi to Ekok was completely empty and the people around it looked hungry. We had decided to go through Ekang rather than retrace our steps through Ikom. Our trusty map showed major roads along this route all the way to Bamenda, Cameroon, our destination. By 0930 we were still the only passengers and the driver was looking evasive. We decided at this rate that we should try the Ikom route so I pressured him to return our 20 N fare. I kept up the pressure and finally, after a long discussion in a local language, the Peugeot driver sold us to the driver of a van standing by and immediately we started to leave the taxi park, but the gate attendant would not allow the van to leave. Normally a vehicle pays around 1 N each time he leaves the park, but the attendant was yelling something about 15 N. The driver wasn’t about to pay and several times tried unsuccessfully to run the barrier when other vehicles were coming in. There was a lot of yelling and commotion and finally our driver had to back off. However, one of his friends went and had a talk with the attendant and after 5 minutes we left the park, everybody smiling. Leaving the city we proceeded to pick up passengers at various points till we had a nearly full van.

All we can figure is that they have an artificially high fare from the park, and drivers take turns filling up at such a profitable rate. Since their turn must not come up very often they are unwilling to leave without a full compliment of suckers. However, since there are many extra vehicles there are plenty of drivers willing to make maverick runs and make smaller profits. There seems to be a lot of friction within the unions as well. Twice, as Helena and I were walking around the market area yesterday, we saw a van full of athletic young men pull up by taxis stopped in traffic. The young men grabbed the taxi keys through the window and started shouting with the driver. The first time the men opened the boot and got the spare tire out and put it in the van until the taxi driver paid some money. The second time it happened in the middle of a traffic circle and they caused such a traffic jam that an orange-shirted traffic warden came over and shooed them out of our sight. We discussed it later with Silas, and he thought surely it was related to the unions, either backed up dues or maverick drivers.

Before we get on the road I will mention another problem we have felt with transportation here. For a country whose No. 1 problem is the world oil glut, we have spent a large amount of time in line for gasoline: 2 hours in the last two days.

We weren’t actually in line all the time. The first time we went straight to the front and backed in as a vehicle left. Apparently there is an unwritten law that transport vehicles, motorcycle drivers, and any other driver without shame can go to the front anytime and nobody in the 10-car line will complain. Even so it took us 1/2 hour or more to get gasoline. The favorite tactic is to back in sideways just as the vehicle leaves. Then the new driver will refuse to move his vehicle until he is given gas. No other vehicle is within reach of the hose, soo...   At the second pump of the day, the man who was dispensing the fuel shut the pump down when the line was built up a ways, and refused to pump until the people in line gave him “money to buy ice water”. The drivers refused, so we all stood around yelling and finally the attendant gave in after about 15 minutes. Now get this, everybody was smiling. He had filled one car and from nowhere swooped a Peugeot taxi. He was the next to be attended; everybody still smiled!

You all must think by now that I am exaggerating on the driving in Nigeria, but as we left Calabar we hit 160 km/hr in the small van (96 mph) and held to it for as long as the paved road permitted. The land soon became hilly and the pavement deteriorated to a strip before we got to Ekang. This time “The Beat” was not Reggae but what we have learned to recognize as “Hi-Life,” a much older type of music in these parts, but very related to Reggae. The trip was actually enjoyable because once the road deteriorated and it became windy the drivah slowed to the point where we never felt that he was out of control.

We boogied up to the Ekang police check about noon, and altogether it took us four hours to complete the “Nigerian border formalities”. Not that the border was crowded. In fact we were the only two people crossing until about 1430 when a yellow Land Rover drove up. Now, we were very nervous at first because we had doctored our currency declaration: and we had four hundred dollars worth hidden in our considerable correspondence.  My heart really dropped when one of the police officials pulled out a computer printout and looked our names up. Everything seemed in order and we went back out to the road where another policeman took all our stuff out on the road and looked through them.

Next, we went to another building that housed emigration and customs. It took them an hour to check our declared currency and go through our packs for the second time. It did not help to come through at siesta time, because the guy who was really in charge was getting ready to go to the river and was not “on seat”. So the guy who checked our form and counted the money had to go back for him and check after every step. Finally the top guy came out with a cloth around his waist and gave his OK for us to leave Nigeria.

Total cost in for us in Nigeria: per day per person - $us 3.92